(7)Ukrainians who want one or more independent states established
within what is now Ukraine (i.e., Republic of Donetsk);
(8)Ukrainians who want to be part of Russia (i.e., Crimea);
(9)Russians who want one or more of these options, but mostly want
the U.S./west to end their decades of threatening and leave Ukraine as much in Russia's sphere of influence as Mexico is in America's.
" "Both sides" means what to Reuters? Which two of nine or more "sides" does Reuters want you to think about? Apparently Reuters wants you to think this is a conflict between Kiev and Moscow, as if Washington had played no role. That makes no sense unless one assumes some sort of political purity in Kiev, despite the regime's illegitimacy and subsequent actions; the Kiev/Moscow reductionism also requires one to assume some sort of pure political malevolency in Moscow, despite its failure to intervene militarily yet and its legitimate interests in what happens on its border and what happens to ethnic Russians beyond its borders. A closer equivalence is between Washington and Moscow, each of which would like to achieve its own geopolitical goals (boding little good for Ukraine either way) without leaving more fingerprints at the crime scene that can be helped. Only a fool would assume that the American CIA chief visited Kiev to tell the government that the U.S. was not getting more involved in the struggle. Only a fool would believe that Kiev's subsequent offensive against protesters (whose actions have been little different from those in the Maidan last winter) was all Kiev's idea. Compared to the elected government's restraint in the face of the Maidan protests, the current Kiev regime is proceeding with lethal rapidity and no apparent comparable effort to negotiate through the crisis.
" "Both sides" is an obvious fiction even within the Reuters story, since those who are "burying their dead" are perhaps on opposites sides (of nine or more) politically, but they are not even close to being on opposite sides of the same confrontation. One side, in Kramatorsk, in northeast Ukraine, is more than 400 miles away from the "other" side in Odessa, in southwest Ukraine. These people are, most likely, total strangers -- not two sides of a neat prevarication.
" "burying their dead" is emotive language, apparently employed here to stir passion, since the burials themselves have no inherent news value (and Reuters doesn't even try to fake that part).
" "Ukraine slides further towards war" misrepresents just about every aspect of what is happening. The underlying assumption, that Ukraine IS sliding towards war cannot be proven until it happens, which gives it an aspect of self-fulfilling prophecy. Focusing only on Ukraine falsifies a situation that includes Russia, the United States, Europe, Israel, border states, and an uncertain number of other actors. "Slides" is a slippery word that suggests no one is in control, when surely one or more sides in Ukraine are strategically ready (if not eager) to accept war.
And why just "war" -- why not "civil war"? Lowgrade civil war may describe just what is happening now in Ukraine, where Ukrainians killing Ukrainians has continued its escalatory creep. Is Reuters secretly dreaming of a wider "war"?
" According to Reuters, "both sides" means "supporters of Russia and of a united Ukraine," as if there weren't another seven of more articulable political positions. So it's nonsense on its face. But what does "supporters of Russia" even mean? What does a "supporter of Russia" want? Annexation? Independence? Autonomy within Ukraine? Friendly international relations? Puppies? And supporters of a "united Ukraine"? What do they want? NATO membership? European Union membership? Non-aligned independence? A federal system? What? What we know about the usurping government in Kiev is that its very first act was to remove Russian from its official language status, which infuriated Russian speakers, no surprise. Kiev has since reinstated Russian's official language status, but it's nowhere near reinstating even minimal trust from people who might be labeled "supporters of Russia."
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